Labour costs per employee for foreign manufacturers were 50% higher than those controlled in Scotland.
In services, foreign-owned companies generated double the value added per worker, and had labour costs 30% higher.
This was largely due to rising fuel prices, although some firms also reported higher labour costs.
Since then it is largely because China's unit labour costs have grown much faster than America's.
That is, that unit labour costs were too high and that they needed to come down.
They deflated that part of the economy, driving down labour costs and up productivity.
The fall in unit labour costs over the past few years temporarily boosted profits.
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Cheaper labour costs are also encouraging foreign direct investment, which was up a quarter in 2007.
Foreign investors say this makes up for the second-highest labour costs in Central America.
And of course total costs are what really interests people, not solely labour costs.
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To stop profits from falling, American companies must keep a tight lid on labour costs.
That meant their margins took a double hit from rising raw materials and labour costs.
They prefer to build factories in Central Europe, which is closer and where labour costs less.
But calculating that would require timely estimates of unit labour costs for all of China's trading partners.
Unit labour costs have fallen at an annualised 2% rate, the steepest cumulative decline since the 1950s.
Moreover, so long as productivity is rising, firms can cut unit labour costs even without pay cuts.
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Even so, the impact of higher labour costs and more cumbersome work rules should not be underestimated.
The biggest threat for companies is that unit labour costs are growing faster than 5% a year.
Bringing down labour costs certainly solves part of the problem, they argue, but what of the deeper issues?
Although emerging-market players are increasingly powerful, it is a myth that their prime advantage is lower labour costs.
Some potential tenants have shunned the vacant pitches at Billingsgate because of the labour costs, says a City source.
In the past 10 years Italian labour costs compared to Germany have risen and the country has lost competitiveness.
And what they did do was simply agree that German labour costs were out of line with German productivity.
As productivity rose wages did not, thus lowering unit labour costs over time.
Amtrak has done little to trim inefficient routes or reduce bloated labour costs.
The company wants to reduce labour costs and improve plant utilisation in Europe.
Last year Vallejo, in California's San Francisco Bay Area, sank into bankruptcy under the weight of its labour costs.
Unskilled-labour costs have been reduced (though by not nearly enough) by cutting employers' welfare charges for the lowest paid.
The revenue raised is to be used to cut surging non-wage labour costs.
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